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Soon: Officials Hold Briefing On Deadly LaGuardia Collision; Fars News: Iran Has "Special Plans" For Israel, Regional Allies; Iran Denies Talks With U.S. As Trump Claims "Points Of Agreement"; ICE Agents Seen Among Long Lines At Several U.S. Airports; Jewish Volunteer Ambulances Set On Fire Outside London Synagogue. Aired 3- 3:30p ET

Aired March 23, 2026 - 15:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

DEREK VAN DAM, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Really put it into context. So, it's all thanks to this heat dome. We've talked about it a lot. We'll get a bit of reprieve, but it's going to build back into the back half of this month and into the early parts of April. Look at the temperatures and we'll see that heat spread eastward. So that's right, you guessed it, the expected record highs will spread eastward along with it. Places like Atlanta to the Deep South, they're going to get in on some of this warmth as well. Back to you.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: Wow. Derek Van Dam, thank you so much for that update. And a new hour of CNN NEWS CENTRAL starts right now.

Any minute now, the Transportation Secretary and the FAA administrator rolled a press conference from LaGuardia after two pilots were killed when an Air Canada plane hit a fire truck on the runway. We're going to bring you their remarks live.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Plus, ICE is now patrolling airports across the country as more TSA agents call out and security lines grow. It's not clear, though, how they will help ease the long wait times for passengers.

And President Trump postponing strikes against Iranian power plants for five days after he said the U.S. held, quote, "productive conversations with Iran." But Tehran is denying that there's any dialogue with the U.S.

We're following these major developing stories and many more all coming in right here to CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

SANCHEZ: Breaking news this hour. CNN has obtained new surveillance footage showing the moment an Air Canada plane collided with a fire truck at New York's LaGuardia airport last night. We should warn you, the video is disturbing.

KEILAR: Here you can see the plane heading down the runway left to right and then the fire truck appearing to cross over the runway. And there's that moment of impact you saw. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and other top officials are expected to give an update on what you just saw and the investigation that has come after it. Just minutes from now, we'll bring that to you. Let's get right to CNN's Shimon Prokupecz, who is at LaGuardia.

And that is really tough to watch. It speaks, Shimon ...

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN SENIOR CRIME AND JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Yes.

KEILAR: ... as we're looking at the wreckage. I mean, you could tell this was a very violent impact. The video obviously confirming that.

PROKUPECZ: Violent to say, right, to say the least here. I still am -- yes, I -- I just find it so remarkable that so many people did survive. When you look at that video, the -- how fast the plane was traveling? It was landing. It was coming in at over a hundred miles an hour on then to see that truck there. What must have been going through the minds of those pilots who did everything they possibly could to try and stop the plane.

They hit the brakes. That's what passengers said. They could feel it. They could hear it. And then, there was just pure chaos on that plane.

And then, those passengers had to really fend for themselves that they -- they had to figure out how to get out. You know, we listened to those emergency instructions. What do you do if you're sitting at an exit row? All of that came into play because the pilots -- the pilots were gone, so they couldn't get any direction from the pilots.

One of the flight attendants was outside that plane. She was in her seat strapped to her seat when rescue workers arrived. We don't know much about the other flight attended right now that was on the plane. We know that flight attendants arrived.

But, you know, when you think about it, you think about these passengers and what they must have been going through, the pilots in those moments. Nothing was left. They somehow were able to bring that plane to a stop. Things went into effect, and hopefully we can learn more about their efforts and the efforts of the passengers and the efforts of rescue workers who worked so hard to get people off that plane and to safety.

There are a lot of questions here, certainly about the air traffic controller and the decisions that this man made. It is the worst case scenario for an air traffic controller. The idea that you are manning the runway, you are manning the grounds there. You give permission for a fire truck that was responding to an emergency. You give that fire truck clearance, and then moments later you see what's about to unfold. And the air traffic controller just chillingly telling that truck, the operators of that truck, stop, stop, stop, and it was too late.

So here, shortly, we'll hear from the Secretary of -- for the Department of Transportation, and later we do expect also to hear from the NTSB.

So we're going to get a lot of information, hopefully, here, or some information which could hopefully shed some light on many of the questions that people have. KEILAR: All right, Shimon, we'll be looking for that here in just a

matter of minutes. Thank you for that report from LaGuardia.

A new ominous warning out of Iran.

[15:05:01]

The semi-official Fars News Agency says Tehran has special plans, that's what they're calling it, to target Tel Aviv and some regional allies of the U.S. and Israel tonight. Sources say this is meant to remove any hope of negotiations on the part of the U.S.

SANCHEZ: That message comes as President Trump touts new talks with a top person in Iran. The President delaying military actions on Iranian energy facilities today, citing what he called productive conversations, conversations Iran has flatly denied are happening.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We are now having really good discussions. They started last night, a little bit the night before that, and I think they're, you know, I think they're very good. They want to -- they want peace. They've agreed they will not have a nuclear weapon, you know, et cetera, et cetera, but we'll see. You have to get it done.

We were planning tomorrow on shooting down some of their power plants, and we're not going to -- we're going to hold that up. Hopefully we won't have to do it, and hopefully we can make a deal that's good for all of us.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SANCHEZ: CNN Political and National Security Analyst David Sanger is here with us. He's the author of "New Cold Wars: China's Rise, Russia's Invasion, and America's Struggle to Defend the West."

David, great to see you as always.

DAVID SANGER, CNN POLITICAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Great to see you, Boris.

SANCHEZ: Let's start with these special plans for Tel Aviv that the Fars News Agency is talking about. It -- it's -- is it designed to remove any hope of what Trump is describing as a positive momentum towards some diplomacy?

SANGER: Look, it's hard to tell because there are so many power centers in Iran. The negotiations with the Iranians before the war were going on with their foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, who's dealt with the U.S. a lot over the years, but he is still viewed with some suspicion by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which is the military, which also runs the nuclear program, and of course there's such chaos in their own upper reaches now because so many of the leaders have been killed. So, part of the problem for the U.S. is who has the authority to

approve a negotiation even if they could come to one, and having killed Larijani, who was the top security official, he would have previously been at least the one they could have negotiated with.

KEILAR: Yes, the Trump administration isn't publicly saying who they're negotiating with.

SANGER: That's right.

KEILAR: Trump is saying they're talking to a top person in Iran. Is it clear to you who it is?

SANGER: It isn't. I mean, if I had to guess, it would be the same people who they were dealing with during the negotiations. He did say that it was being handled by Steve Witkoff, his special envoy, and Jared Kushner, his son-in-law. They were the two who went and were meeting with Mr. Araghchi in Geneva prior to this.

So, it may simply be bringing that channel up, but there are lots of other players who are saying they're passing messages, the Turks, the Omanis and all that. But the fact of the matter is, at this point, you've got a president who needed to get out of the threat that he issued on Saturday. He could have tonight started attacking those power plants.

First, it's likely a violation of the Geneva Conventions. They're considered to be civilian infrastructure.

Second, the biggest power plant they have, he didn't name -- name it, is a nuclear power plant. You wouldn't want to be shooting at that, obviously.

And third, if he had done that, it almost certainly would have resulted in the Iranians widening the war even more, attacking Gulf countries and their power plants. So, his threat might have caused him more trouble than good.

SANCHEZ: The President also told CNN's Kaitlan Collins that the U.S. and Iran had reached agreement on 15 points, including an Iranian commitment to not having a nuclear weapon. How is that different than what the administration described as the status of negotiations before? How is that different from the nuclear deal that President Obama signed?

SANGER: Right. The -- the Iranians have promised not to have a nuclear weapon consistently over the past 20 years. It's written into the agreement that President Obama came to in 2015 and that President Trump scrapped in 2018. And so, I -- it doesn't surprise me the Iranians have said that. We also have seen evidence that they were working on designs that looked like they were nuclear weapons and those leaked out, some of them stolen by the Israelis.

My biggest concern, Boris, is this, that after these three weeks of war, a new hardened, embittered leadership, if they are still in place, is going to look around the world and say, we got attacked and the North Koreans didn't.

[15:10:04]

Why did that happen? Because the North Koreans already had their nuclear weapons.

And so, we might be incentivizing them to race for a bomb with this, and that's part of the downside of taking these kind of actions. I'm not saying as a result that we should have let the program go on, but you've got to recognize that you do something like that. If you're not fully successful, the results can be the opposite of what you had in mind.

KEILAR: All right, David Sanger, thank you so much for being with us. We do appreciate it.

SANGER: Thank you.

KEILAR: And still to come, ICE agents are reporting for duty at multiple airports across the country as the TSA faces growing call- outs from employees who have been working without pay.

SANCHEZ: Plus, an antisemitic attack in London. Police looking for three masked individuals after ambulances belonging to a Jewish rescue organization were set on fire outside a synagogue.

And later, in a new lawsuit, architectural and historic preservation groups are asking a federal judge to stop President Trump's plan to temporarily close and extensively renovate the Kennedy Center. With that much more coming your way momentarily.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:15:30]

SANCHEZ: Staffing shortages creating another day of gridlock and long lines at airports across the country. And today, ICE agents are being sent out amid the partial government shutdown.

KEILAR: Hundreds of TSA employees have quit since the shutdown started. Thousands more are regularly calling out sick instead of working without pay. CNN's Ryan Young is with us now from Hartsfield- Jackson Atlanta International Airport.

Ryan, tell us what the status is where you are. And I know you've been seeing ICE agents there. What have you been seeing them doing?

RYAN YOUNG, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yep. Finally, we can take a deep breath here. The numbers have dropped off. The lines are getting shorter. I think the average wait time now is under 40 minutes. So, if you have a flight to catch today, it's a good time to come to Hartsfield-Jackson International.

Talking about those ICE agents, you can see a few behind me right there. And then, I'm going to walk you this direction and you can see some more of them gathered over here. This is what they've been doing for the most part today is doing the patrols around the airport, talking and gathering, not really helping the public in the sense of they're -- they're not taking tickets from anybody. They're not interacting with the public we've seen so far. They're not checking anyone's ID. At the TSA checkpoints, they're not doing that as -- as well.

So, the big question is what have they been doing mostly? Well, it's been providing programmer security as you can see over here. If we come back this direction, there's also a contingent of officers over here. And the reason why is what we're being told is there's a protest scheduled against ICE here at the airport in the next two hours or so.

So, now, you have extra police officers from the Atlanta Police Department ready to respond to what may happen when protesters arrive. And we've been told they actually applied for a permit. So, now, you're bringing all these people, surging them into one area.

This is where the lines have been long throughout the day. The lines now are gone. So, that's a good news, whether it's the North, the South terminals or even the main checkpoint, we've been told that the lines now again are under 30 minutes, which is fantastic. That's after Sunday when it was more than five hours and we saw lines stretch outside the building.

When we arrived here at 6 A.M. this morning, there were thousands of people trying to get through the airport. We talked to several people who we just checked through to try to see how long it would take them. Average wait time was over two hours. And right now the airport GM is actually telling us they believe the numbers are about a 30% call out.

And now we've talked to TSA, a steward who tells us, look, they believe things could get better, but they want to get paid sometime soon.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE BOREK, TSA OFFICER: Is this going to be the new normal? You know, is -- is every weekend, you know, going to be a five, six hour wait at the checkpoints to get -- get on your flight, if you can even make it. What's evident with your eyes, you're seeing is this is a breakdown of TSA system. That's what you're seeing. When Friday comes and there's no paycheck, what are we going to see next weekend?

YOUNG: Yes, guys, we'll continue to watch this right now. Again, the numbers seem pretty good. We'll see how it goes throughout the rest of the day.

SANCHEZ: Ryan Young, live for us in Atlanta. Thank you so much.

So, police in London are investigating what they say is an antisemitic hate crime after Jewish volunteer ambulances were set on fire outside a synagogue. We have the latest there when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:23:17] KEILAR: A neighborhood in London is shaken after several ambulances

belonging volunteer rescue organization were set on fire outside of a synagogue this morning.

SANCHEZ: The attack targeting the city's largest Jewish community is being investigated as a hate crime. Here's CNN's Clare Sebastian.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CLARE SEBASTIAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Even in a community already on high alert, few would have predicted this. Explosions raffling this North London neighborhood in the early hours of Monday morning, as fire engulfed four ambulances parked outside a synagogue.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEDALE WEINSTEIN, LOCAL RESIDENT: My wife and I got disturbed by a huge explosion at 1.45 A.M. because we live literally 50 yards away from where we are now. And we thought, okay, what's going on here? What's happening? And then, 10 minutes thereafter, a -- a bigger explosion, sounded like a bomb.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SEBASTIAN (voice over): The fire brigade says the explosions were caused by gas cylinders igniting inside the ambulances. No one was hurt. The U.K.'s counter-terror police are now leading the investigation, which police say is focused on three suspects. CCTV emerged showing three masked figures setting one of the ambulances alight.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KEIR STARMER, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: Well, this is a horrific antisemitic attack. And, of course, my thoughts, I think all of our thoughts will be with those in the vicinity, the -- the residents who are understandably very concerned, Jewish community across the country deeply concerned.

(END VIDEO CLIP)'

SEBASTIAN (voice over): The ambulances belonged to a Jewish volunteer rescue organization serving both Jewish and non-Jewish residents in this area.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DEAN COHEN, LOCAL COUNCILLOR: This is a direct attack on this, on the Jewish community on -- you cannot get more low than destroying ambulances that are there to save lives.

[15:25:06]

SEBASTIAN (off camera): Well, this is a very visible Jewish community here in North London. There are lots of synagogues, and shops, and Jewish schools lining the streets. So, while people tell us that they are shocked and in disbelief, frankly, that ambulances would be targeted, they're also saying that they were worried something like this would happen.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SEBASTIAN (voice over): Security had been stepped up around Jewish sites across the U.K. after a deadly attack at a Manchester synagogue last October.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DOV FORMAN, LOCAL RESIDENT: Things could get a lot worse. This violent antisemitism is going to get worse. And this won't be the last attack against the Jewish people if we continue just to kind of try to tackle the spread of the fire and not go to the roots of the antisemitism, the extremism that's running rife across society today.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SEBASTIAN (voice over): Last year, it was Yom Kippur. This year, preparations for Passover marred by violence.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

(CROSSTALK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... save lives, whether you're Jewish or non- Jewish.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SEBASTIAN (voice over): Anger and fear here rising that another Middle East war is worsening what they say is a climate of hate.

Clare Sebastian, CNN, London.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KEILAR: Our thanks to Clare for that.

We are standing by right now for a briefing from the nation's top transportation officials on that deadly collision at LaGuardia Airport. Stay with CNN. We'll be right back.